Its a contest of contrasting fortunes as table toppers Rajasthan Royals, playing their third home match in a row, come up against Royal Challengers Bangalore who are languishing at the bottom of the IPL table with just 1 win in four games. RR themselves, lost their last match against Kings XI Punjab and will be looking to get back to winning ways against a Bangalore side low on confidence.
Shane Watson has made a brilliant comeback since his injury and with Rahane in outstanding form, the double R’s will be banking on yet another good opening start to set the platform for the guys to follow. Steve Smith has been off colour of late, but is a good player of spin, one of RCB’s bright spots in what has been a disappointing campaign so far. The other batsmen too have contributed in the few chances they have got.
The same cannot be said of their counterparts in the RCB side however. Dinesh Karthick has failed to live up to the huge price tag he commanded at the auctions. Him batting higher than AB De Villiers has also led to criticism of the Bangalore team management and rightly so. The best players simply need to bat the most number of balls. AB just hasnt had time to play himself in with the required rate soaring by the time he reaches the crease. Virat Kohli, might have scored a fifty in the last match, but he will be the first to admit it wasn’t a good knock in the circumstances.It will be interesting to see whether Chris Gayle, who apparently dropped himself for the clash against CSK, comes back in.
RR have bowled well as a bowling unit, with Chris Morris and Pravin Tambe standing out. James Faulkner has been expensive and has looked short of form since a good opening game. They have a number of bowling options, sometimes a bit too many considering how Tambe has not bowled his full quota, sans one game. Kohli meanwhile is the farthest from that luxury, with his team’s bowling causing headaches aplenty. The spin combo of Chahal and Iqbal Abdulla has been bowling well and the return of Mitchell Starc has sure added much needed firepower to the pace attack.
srikantkk 